1931-1940

  • Jacques Feyder – Knight Without Armour (1937)

    1931-1940AdventureDramaJacques FeyderUnited Kingdom

    Because he can pass as a Russian, A.J. Fothergill is recruited to spy on the revolutionary movement in Russia in 1913. He becomes imprisoned in Siberia, as a revolutionary, until the 1917 uprisings. Amid the turmoil of the civil war between the red and white armies, he tries to flee Russia along with the beautiful Countess Alexandra.Read More »

  • Muzhi Yuan – Ma lu tian shi AKA Street Angel (1937)

    1931-1940ArthouseChinaDramaMuzhi Yuan

    In old Shanghai, two sisters, a prostitute and a singer, tried to escape from the local scoundrels with the help of a trumpet player and a newspaper seller.Read More »

  • Busby Berkeley – Babes in Arms (1939)

    Busby Berkeley1931-1940ComedyMusicalUSA

    Quote:
    Mickey Moran (Mickey Rooney) and Patsy Barton (Judy Garland), the children of vaudeville performers, spring into action when their homes and their lives are put in danger. Vaudeville is dead, and the group of performers, led by Mickey’s parents, Joe and Florrie Moran (Charles Winninger and Grace Hayes) who have made comfortable homes on Long Island, now must go back on tour in the sticks to try and scrounge up some money. Naturally, the kids of show biz performers want to help, but they’re shot down by their rigid parents who don’t see any need in updating their tired old acts.Read More »

  • Frank Borzage – Green Light (1937)

    Frank Borzage1931-1940DramaRomanceUSA

    A brilliant young surgeon takes the blame for a colleague when a botched surgery causes a patient’s death and buries himself at a wilderness research facility.Read More »

  • John Ford – Stagecoach (1939)

    1931-1940ClassicsJohn FordUSAWestern

    Synopsis:
    John Ford’s landmark Western revolves around an assorted group of colorful passengers aboard the Overland stagecoach bound for Lordsburg, New Mexico, in the 1880s. An alcoholic philosophizer (Thomas Mitchell), a lady of ill repute (Claire Trevor) and a timid liquor salesman (Donald Meek) are among the motley crew of travelers who must contend with an escaped outlaw, the Ringo Kid (John Wayne), and the ever-present threat of an Apache attack as they make their way across the Wild West.Read More »

  • Leopold Lindtberg – Die Missbrauchten Liebesbriefe AKA The Misused Love Letters (1940)

    1931-1940ComedyDramaLeopold LindtbergSwitzerland

    The Misused Love Letters was one of the most popular Swiss films in the 40s.

    It tells the story of a merchant from the town of Seldwyla, called Viktor Störteler. He has a passion for literature and rather fancies himself as a poet, although his poetry is mediocre at best. While away on business, he asks his wife to send him a daily love letter. His wife Gritli however is not to keen on this idea and ask the young teacher Wilhelm to write her love letters instead. Wilhelm does so, but believes himself to be the addressee of the letters. Viktor comes to know of their little scheme when he returns and gets offended. As a result he takes a momentous decision, that will have consequences for all parties involved…Read More »

  • Gerhard Lamprecht – Einmal eine große Dame sein AKA Just Once A Great Lady (1934)

    Gerhard Lamprecht1931-1940ComedyGermanyMusicalThird Reich Cinema

    Quote:
    People on Sunday. Kitty Holm’s girlfriends dream of men and clothes. But Kitty, a salesgirl in a car showroom has bigger dreams – she wants to be a great lady. On Monday, Kitty manages to sell a luxury automobile for the princely sum of 40,000 deutsche marks. It seems her dream might be fulfilled when buyer Mr. Thurner, and his daughter Ria, ask Kitty to deliver the new auto to Wolfenstein Castle herself. On the drive, she plays the great lady, but when she introduces herself as a countess to the son of the family, she’s gone just a bit too far … Gerhard Lamprecht’s merry sound film operetta celebrates the escapist dreams of glory of lowly shop girls that were the hallmark of Erich Pommer’s comedies for the Ufa studio. Read More »

  • Fernando de Fuentes – El prisionero 13 (1933)

    Fernando de Fuentes1931-1940ClassicsMexicoPolitics

    Two gripping stories are interwoven in Prisoner 13; a son pays for his father’s faults, and a desperate mother tries to save her son’s life at any cost. Destiny and corruption play a trick on Carrasco when he is bribed to free a revolutionary and arrest someone in his place. Unbeknownst to him he ends up arresting his own son.
    Fernando de Fuentes’ “Revolution trilogy” opens with this gripping tale of corruption and family conflict, as a powerful colonel (Alfredo del Diestro) agrees to release a revolutionary he has in custody as part of a bargain to arrest another person to take the prisoner’s place. The bribe backfires when the colonel’s own son is accidentally captured to seal the deal. Potent drama from Mexico also stars Luis G. Barreiro, Adela Sequeyro, and Antonio R. Frausto. 76 mRead More »

  • Sidney Lanfield – Wake Up and Live (1937)

    1931-1940ComedyMusicalSidney LanfieldUSA

    Synopsis:
    Built around the publicity “feud” between newspaper-radio-gossip spreader Walter Winchell and band leader Ben Bernie, a radio star, Alice Huntley (Alice Faye), who does an advice-and-inspiration program, helps a mike-shy singer, Eddie Kane (Jack Haley) to success by tricking him into singing with Bernie’s orchestra. Winchell uses it to expose Bernie as the trickster. But Kane becomes a great hit with the radio public, and falls in love with Alice. And Bernie and Winchell shake hands to show there’s no business like show business and fabricated feuds.Read More »

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